After watching a recent Black comedy show (without finding a damn
thing funny), I thought it appropriate for Blacks to get another history
lesson.

Once
upon a time in slavery days, Blacks were separated into two main groups-those
who worked in the Field and those who worked in the House. Typically,
the slaves in the big house drew the favor of the slavemaster and
some would go out of their way to gain that favor, even if it meant
demeaning themselves and/or their family.

When uprisings were organized (yes, some slaves actually got together
and kicked Massah's ass, even though many were summarily attacked
and killed), or escapes planned (contrary to historical reports, we
didn't just sit around and wait for good ol' Abe), the House Niggers
would often gather information and report to Massah, in order to capture
the favor of the slavemaster.

House Niggers would even take up the beating of other slaves to show
Massah that they were indeed "good Niggers."

Typically, House Niggers would do anything and everything to gain
the favor of the slavemaster, while Field Niggers did all of the hard
work and were generally the only ones to stand against slavery.

Malcolm X often spoke about House Niggers and their self-effacement,
explaining that if Massah would talk about his sickness, the House
Nigger would ask: "We sick, boss?"

But somewhere along the way, people stopped talking about House Niggers
and Field Niggers as though they ceased to exist.

Now, we hear elitist Blacks talk about poor Blacks, as if they are
the problem. But poor Blacks are not the race's problem. Our problem
is our image and our image is in the hands of politicians, criminals
(who are not all poor), athletes and entertainers, including comedians
who are live on stage, making people laugh AT us.

My contention is that there has been a diminishing of pride in our
race, because even we are sucking up the mostly horrid images of us
in the media. This is the precise reason why we are in such poor shape.

If there were more pride left in our race, House Nigger comedians
would not be laughed at by us, they would be chastised. We would not
pile into Def Comedy Jam, or any other modern Minstrel show to laugh
at ourselves and/or our culture, and half of the House Nigger comedic
actors with ample work would be working in enmity of their own people.

If
there were more pride left in our people, no one would hate me for
writing these words.

Here
are some examples of House Nigger comedy and why it is dangerous:

DL
Hugely tells a joke about the difference between whites and Blacks
on break at work. His joke has a typical punchline for Black comedy.
He says that whites do what they are supposed to do, but when Niggers
go on break-they break.

Chris
Rock jokes about how there is a difference between Blacks and Niggers
and proceeds to tell the world that he hates Niggers. The audience
cracks up laughing, but the problem is that the white man in the back
of the audience is vice president of the company you work for and
he won't promote you because HE ALSO believes there's a difference
between Blacks and Niggers and he thinks YOU may be just like that
Nigger Chris Rock.

Still
funny?

The
argument that House Niggers, their advocates and apologists use when
defending their self-effacing comedy is that whites also clown themselves
and their culture. That argument fails because whites don't have an
image problem. Blacks do. Moreover, no one has the ugly history with
film and television that Black people have.

Our
relationship with film and television has always been a dicey proposition
at best and derogatory at worst. It began with historically revisionist
stories rife with negative images of Blacks found in the "classic"
Birth Of A Nation.

The
relationship deepened with comedy relief icons like Stepinfetchit,
Buckwheat and Rochester, all of whom used to make "Massah"
laugh and feel safe by bucking their eyes when scared, talking in
slow, silly monotones and otherwise showing that they were completely
without intelligence and no danger to the white man. The image of
Black women were hardly safe with visions of the "mammy"
(the obese, motherly, often overly strong darkie who would attack
her man and neglect her own children, but lay down her life to protect
little white kids) being perpetuated by Butterfly McQueen, Aunt Jemima
and Sapphire.

Harmless,
silly Blacks from Jimmie Walker and right on into Martin Lawrence,
The Wayans brothers and nearly every popular black comedian today
are bringing negative images from the early days of entertainment
into the new millennium, while pretending that they are doing something
new and revolutionary.

There
is very little difference between the eye-popping buffoonery of Stepinfetchit
and the bulging white-eyes of Chris Tucker, Martin Lawrence and Bernie
Mac. There is very little difference between the horrible image of
Butterfly McQueen or Aunt Jemima and those fat loud women on "The
Parkers."

Once
upon a time, most of our people would frown upon negative images like
these. Today, most of us think they are funny.

These
comedians are demeaning the image of Black people, but ignorant people
will attack me for speaking about it. I will take the heat, because
I know that Black people have an image problem.

If
there were no image problem, then some of the most prominent African
Americans would not be so anxious to distance themselves from the
experience.

The
point here is that not everyone is all that happy with being Black.
The reason why is that being Black in America has been marketed as
the worst thing to be. Period. That marketing has been so effective,
that even some of us accept it, which is why we changed our label
to African American.

The
conundrum is that being Black and the Black experience have been diminished
because of the antics of House Niggers, yet House Niggers are the
first ones to rail against Black people.

In
fact, some of the worst crimes perpetrated against Black people are
perpetrated by other Blacks. The charge against Affirmative Action
was lead by a House Nigger (Ward Connerly), sorry poets passing for
rappers push fake gangsterism and abject materialism to our youth,
and do I even have to evoke the racial crimes of Clarence Thomas?

It's
late in the day for any Black person to be acting like a coon to entertain
white people and get a paycheck. Let's not be fooled. House Niggers
are alive and well and causing our people a great deal of misery.

Darryl
James launched the only Black owned rap music publication, Rap Sheet
in 1992. He is the author of "Bridging The Black Gender Gap,"
which is also the basis of a national seminar series. James was awarded
the 2004 Non-fiction Award for his book on the Los Angeles Riots at
the Seventh Annual Black History Month Book Fair and Conference in
Chicago. He can be reached at djames@TheBlackGenderGap.com.